Explanation of some quotes

[theosis]

I'm interested to hear an elucidation of the LDS idea that God the Father was once a mortal man:

God himself was once as we are now, and is an exalted man... I am going to tell you how God came to be God. We have imagined and supposed that God was God from all eternity. I will refute that idea... He was once a man like us; yea, that God himself, the Father of us all, dwelt on an earth.
- Smith

Remember that God, our heavenly Father, was perhaps once a child, and mortal like we ourselves, and rose step by step in the scale of progress, in the school of advancement; has moved forward and overcome, until He has arrived at the point where He now is.
- Orson Hyde

He is our Father-the Father of our spirits, and was once a man in mortal flesh as we are, and is now an exalted Being. How many Gods there are, I do not know. But there never was a time when there were not Gods and worlds, and when men were not passing through the same ordeals that we are now passing through.
- Brigham Young

 

[Orontes]

I am using some of my points from another thread that touched on the same topic.

The Smith quotes are tied to sermons from Joseph Smith: the King Follet Discourse and Sermon of the Grove. They are not part of Mormon scripture. Why not? The sermons are not written in Joseph Smith’s hand, but rather are the recollections of some who were present. There are a few a versions and they are not consistent with each other. It is unclear what Smith actually said. Therefore, no Mormon is bound by them. However, the belief the Father was incarnated at some point, like the Son, is/was a common belief among Mormons. The two quotes by Young and Hyde are examples.

The scriptural reference for this idea is: John 5:19 ““Then answered Jesus and said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do: for what things soever he doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise.” The idea therefore is: if the Son assumed a mortal state, the Father must have also.

Per a multiplicity of gods: Mormonism is arbitrary in its use of god. It can refer to a being, but also refer to a way of being. Any who fully participate in that way of being are therefore divine. This is taken as the ultimate goal: exaltation, a oneness with Deity.